Dimon Sees Threat From Silicon Valley

Speaking at the U.S. bank’s investor day on Tuesday, Mr. Dimon said tech firms were among the main competitors the bank could face in the future.

“When I go to Silicon Valley…they all want to eat our lunch. Every single one of them is going to try,” he said. Mr. Dimon highlighted the strength technology companies had in areas such as consumer banking and payments and their encryption and verification capabilities.

The likes of Apple and Google aren’t the only threat the bank faces, however. Mr. Dimon added that J.P. Morgan could also face added competition from shadow banks, traditional financial institutions and large Chinese banks that are expanding globally.

He said Wells Fargo, for example, was poised to be a major investment bank in the U.S. in five years.

“From Goldman and Wells Fargo to some new entrants…we know there are going to be attacks everywhere. That’s capitalism and I think that’s a good thing,” he said.

Mr. Dimon’s comments capped an investor day in which he highlighted the progress the bank made in the last year – “I am so damn proud of this company” – and touted the fact that the bank did not need to make any significant shifts in its strategy.

Still, the meeting followed a tumultuous year for the bank. It agreed to more than $20 billion in regulatory and legal settlements and aggressively added to its ranks of staff in control functions. It hired 7,000 such staff in 2013 and plans to add at least 3,000 more in 2014.